This is one of those posts for the not so weak of heart. It is long, but I promised I would write it and I try to keep my promises. If so inclined, consider reading it your Lenten penance for the day! It was mine to write it.
Nearly two months ago now, thousands of people walked the streets of our nation’s capital to mark the anniversary of Roe vs Wade, the 1974 legislation that makes abortion a legal act in the United States. It is no small undertaking, as January is often wet and bitter in DC and spending significant time outdoors is truly an act of will. Certainly not a local event, marchers came from all over the country to stand with others in support of the smallest members of our society. The purpose of the March for Life is to peacefully and prayerfully underscore the number of people in our country who support the right to life of the children whose lives end in abortion. The hope is that this profound witness of belief, presented in the public square, will educate the public about the miracle of life; changing the hearts and minds of those who see an unexpected child as a threat to their freedom. The March is an important element of building a culture of life, but that is exactly what it is - an element. And similar to the elements found in the periodic table, it really needs to be bound to other elements to have a great and synergistic impact upon the culture.
One of the negatives of the March for Life is that it is on the anniversary of Roe v Wade. While it is necessary to mark this day, it almost seems that the abortion law gets more attention because of it. And while this civil statute is representative of the culture in which we live, we must not confuse the law with the culture. Yes repealing the law would instantly make it illegal for a woman to procure an abortion, but abortion would still remain. Women obtained abortions before Roe v Wade and will continue to do so even if it were repealed. To truly end abortion, there needs to be no desire for it. And that is not merely a change of civil law, but a change of the minds of those under the law. No, Roe v. Wade doesn’t make sense in culture that is otherwise replete with claims for individual rights. No, Roe v Wade doesn’t respect the natural law of creation. Yes, we need to let elected officials see how many people don’t think this is how our nation should treat its children. But what else do we need to do? What is it going to take to change the culture that will ultimately make abortion go away? How do we build a culture of life which respects the dignity of the human person from conception to natural death?
One of the many things I learned in my years as a management consultant was the importance of meeting the client where they were. It is impossible to build consensus by merely dictating a solution and imposing it. No one likes to be told they are doing things wrong. Rather, people will commit to finding a way to do things right. Buy-in as we termed it, was essential to the success of every change implementation. And so it is true here in building the culture of life. There are many people who are indeed swayed by the likes of pro life advocates showing the horrors of abortion. But there are just as many, if not more, who are put off by such approaches, however true they may be. And this may be why. Posters of aborted children are negative, they describe what it is that is not desirable, but they stop there. They tell us what we are doing wrong, whether we are having the abortion or ignoring the fact that others do. These pictures may be the uncomfortable wake up call that there is problem, but these pictures don’t promote the solution. Similarly there are statistics everywhere on the number of abortions performed each moment in our country. But these don’t tell the stories of a culture of life. It is impossible to embrace a negative. These approaches promote something to run away from, but don’t present the end to which we should be running. In other words, it does little good to say that abortion is evil without giving an authentic picture of life as good.
Regrettably in our media soaked culture, what makes the front page is the bad news – the child harmed by his parents -because it is not the norm- rather than the multitude of success stories of the children who are loved by their parents. It is this insidious onslaught of negativity that distorts our vision of family life and cultivates the erroneous denominator that children are a burden. And the more time that we as a nation spend in the realm of the Internet looking at the culture of death, the less time we spend gazing upon and building the realities of life right outside our door. So to turn the culture, we must meet it where it lies and present the culture of life as a better way. And that means not only in the social media and the digital world, but also in the traditional brick and mortar world of our communities. Some may negatively term all of this as a culture war. If that be true, the similarity to a political war is that there is a desire for change and that change can be wrought by the power of the pen and word as well as our own hands. And both of these need to be tirelessly ordered toward promoting life even more so than decrying abortion.
Critics contend that pro–life activities seem to end as soon as a baby is born, leaving a large burden of impoverished unwanted children in society. The ensuing logic is that it is better to abort a child than increase the welfare roles. Yes, a child needs the support of family throughout life, and where that family doesn’t exist, we need to build one. And that takes time, toil, and treasure. We need to give it, freely. No law, government program, has ever solved poverty. It is a cold hard fact that it needs to be eliminated by our own two hands. And if we aren’t feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, and materially supporting the child from conception to natural death, abortion is always going to look like the logical choice. Whatever the circumstances that led a woman to an unintended pregnancy, it is necessary for her to see her child is a gift and that is utterly impossible if all one can see is material struggles. Yes parenthood has struggles to help us grow in holiness, but for the woman with an unexpected child, she can’t see the gift of the forest for the trees of need.
And it is here in our need to tangibly and physically provide a culture of life that our digital existence harms us. With our heads down into our smart phones, we don’t see the woman in need across the train car. The grim pictures of those in need as we touch scroll the headlines are just momentary images before we can click them away for the next app. Our life in the information age keeps realities at a distance and keeps us from being present in them. And curiously these modern conveniences seem to fill our every second with activity, so we feel we have no time for philanthropic pursuits. Mother Teresa did so much for the needy children of India without ever toting a Blackberry.
Beyond the material provisions for preborn children, that need to be endowed, present and waiting with open arms for every child, communicating a culture of life in word and action is essential to educating our world about the wonders that lie in every human life. The culture needs not only to be changed in the immediate radius of the woman in distress, but also in the greater environs of a community. Each and every opportunity to promote the beauty of life must be taken. The older woman in the grocery store, unhampered by the political correctness that tells us to ignore the tantruming child, redirects the child by engaging him in conversation. The high school student is proud of his large family and his resume replete with not only varsity sports but numerous games of Candyland and hours of reading fairy tales to his siblings. To build a culture of life that views abortion as an unnecessary and unthinkable response to the news of a new child, children of all ages must be celebrated for the amazing gift that they are. Whether it be our alms, our prayer, or our time, children must be at the top of the list. And it is in that time which we invest in being with children, being for children that hearts are changed; starting with our very own. Nor can the actions we take be just for our own children. In order to build a sense of community where any new child is welcomed; we need to habitually be investing our energy in our neighbors’ children as well. If we don’t expand beyond our given children, then we risk cultivating isolated oases rather than a true culture of life.
There are many obstacles to building the culture of life, some which are diminishing through the efforts of people to promote the beauty of life. One of these is the distortion of the reality that a child exists from the moment of conception. The amazing world of science has shown conception is an incredible moment when a new life, complete with all he will ever have genetically is present and that life is definitely human. However, this has changed the argument from when human life does life begin, to whether or not that human life is a person. In simple logic, human and person should be equated, for how can one be a person without being human? Yet "person" is debated as a functional capacity or one's ability to participate in society. So not only is the unborn child not yet a person, the mentally impaired are no longer persons, simply because of the things they can (or cannot) do, instead of who they are. To support the logic that personhood is not endowed at the moment of conception, some will even incorrectly reference St. Thomas Aquinas and his commentary on “quickening”, or the moment when a mother first feels her child move in her womb. Aquinas said that ensoulment must occur at this moment as that is when one is sure that there is human life. But this is touted as evidence teachings on the beginning of life have changed. Not so. The teaching is that ensoulment and personhood happen at the moment that a new human life is created. Based on the science of the time, Aquinas saw that moment as definitively at quickening, allowing that it may happen earlier, but he didn’t know that with certainty. At that time there was no other means to be sure that a woman was with child and not suffering medical ailment. Yet quickening has long been replaced by HCG tests and sonograms. There is no question how Aquinas would interpret the amazing wonders of modern life science. We now know that there is a human life at conception. A person is created and becomes part of our human family.
Promoting the beauty of the unborn child and celebrating the moment of conception are key positives to building a culture of life. It is happening. Sonogram pictures are quite common, tacked to the bulletin boards in the cubicles of expectant parents. Yet it is still common practice to not share the news of a new child until they are 8 to 12 weeks of age for fear he or she may pass away. Would it not be better to enlist all to care for a child from the very beginning, by aiding the mother? Praying for the new child? Parents also may discover the sex of their child before he or she is born, further confirming the personhood of the child. And yet these same parents often withhold giving (or keep secret until birth) a name for the child, the most fundamental expression of our individual personhood. Yes there is much to be changed if we are to truly see conception as the beginning of a child’s life.
And there is a unique way to do this among the Christian peoples of the world. We so rightly celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior each and every year at Christmas. It is no secret that this holy day heralding the good news of salvation has been secularized into a holiday of abstract sentiment. The joyous festive announcement of the most important birth in all of human history is set aside for the politically correct “season’s greetings.” Without question, reattaching the iconic tangible festivities of Christmas back to the birth of He who is the Christ is a fundamental step toward viewing the birth of every child as an amazinglyimportant gift. That He who is God saw becoming a child as a necessary element of our redemption, can only underscore the value of the birth of every child. Yet there is another day in the liturgical life of the Christian, which speaks to the necessity of Christ’s humanity in the plan for our salvation. And in our modern times, enlightened by science, yet steeped in abortion, perhaps this day needs all the energy of the pro-life community - even more than Christmas! That day is the Feast of the Annunciation. This is the day that modern science would confirm for us, that our merciful Lord encased all of His infinite goodness in the smallest possible physical form of a preborn child. And it was most distressing news to His mother, Mary, who stood to bear much shame for her out of wedlock pregnancy. But she said, yes! Why? Because she trusted Providence that all would be well. And why could she have this trust in God? Because the culture around her, respecting and promoting the goodness of God and all that He created, shored her up at the quaking moment when she was asked to cooperate with grace. There is so much about the Annunciation in which we can rejoice. It is truly the holy day we need.
No, the Annunciation is not a holy day of obligation for Catholics. It could just slip by again this year unnoticed. Or perhaps we can clear our schedules a bit and take the day to spend with a child or do service to aid children. As is most often the case, the feast falls during Lent, so it is an appropriate day for acts of charity. But it is also a Solemnity – the highest of liturgical celebrations – meaning that we should celebrate and be happy. The Annunciation is not the day to decry abortion with the horrors of a child who died at the hands of his mother. Rather it is the day to celebrate the beginning of the life of the Child, as a step toward building the culture that resounds with joy at the beginning of the life of each and every child. A step in the greater march for life.
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